Developer Alert: 800×600 Resolution Still Strong on the Web

OneStat.com today reported that more and more internet users choose for screen resolution 1024x768 which is the most popular screen resolution for exploring the internet. Users with monitors set to the most common resolution 800x600 for web sites have an approximate 31.7 percent global usage share. Seeing these numbers, both web designers and also application and OS developers should take into account that their projects (not counting specialized 3D/CAD/DTP apps etc) should be designed in a way that they totally fit and are usable on 800 pixels wide.

Apple Hits the Fast Track; More Apple News

Regarding the latest on Apple's side: The Guardian has an article, "a look inside Apple's new push for speed" Sanluisobispo says, "G5 breaks Apple's speed limit" Sunspot says. Elsewhere, Apple has quietly posted the winners of the Eighth Annual Apple Design Awards, which "honored developers for the creation of outstanding Macintosh-compatible software products." Also, this document is a high-level summary of the salient features to keep in mind while (re)targetting your programs to run on the G5.

Multitasking OS for the Mattel Intellivision

If this really works, this is the coolest hobby OS I've seen it a while. IntyOS is an operating system for the old Intellivision gaming console. There are Intellivision emulators available if you'd like to try it out, but it's acutally possible to run this on the original console if you have a (now out of production) "Intellicart" unit. Of course, there are few applications for it (clock, CPU load, "IntyAmp"), so its chances of unseating Windows on the corporate desktop are slim.

Enterprise Linux Server Distributions

"When we pitted Red Hat Enterprise Linux against several flavors of UnitedLinux to see how each fared as an enterprise server platform, we found each edition of the popular GNU/Linux operating system to represent a distinct method on how to build bare metal into a working server. Installation is different, configuration options are different, and hardware support varies across these Linux flavors." Read the review at NWFusion.

SCO Smear Campaign Can’t Defeat GNU Community

"SCO's contract dispute with IBM has been accompanied by a smear campaign against the whole GNU/Linux system. But SCO made an obvious mistake when it erroneously quoted me as saying that "Linux is a copy of Unix." Many readers immediately smelled a rat--not only because I did not say that, and not only because the person who said it was talking about published ideas (which are uncopyrightable) rather than code, but because they know I would never compare Linux with Unix." Read RMS' editorial at ZDNet.

Mandrake Goes For High Performance Clustering

At the International Supercomputer Conference 2003 today, MandrakeSoft announced its latest entry to the company's growing portfolio of middle-to-high end server products. MandrakeClustering is a high performance clustering distribution for IA-32 and AMD64 (Opteron) architectures. IA-64 support should come in September, the company reported. Read about the announcement at OfB.biz and here..

Better Java Garbage Collection with IBM’s JDK 1.4.0; More Java News

This article discusses incremental compaction, a new feature in the memory management component of IBM JDK 1.4.0. Incremental compaction is a way of spreading compaction work across different garbage collection cycles, thereby reducing pause times. Elsewhere, industry leaders discuss Java status Quo. Also, Eclipse SDK 2.1 leverages Java’s strengths, but beware of too much expansion, InfoWorld says.

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Apple on WWDC: Innovation or Catch Up?

I was present at Apple's WWDC yesterday and witnessed one of the historical moments in Apple's history, the introduction of their 64-bit platform. Am I impressed? The answer is complicated. I was happy to see Apple moving on and deliver. But I would have expected nothing less from a 4 billion tech company who had the need to catch up with the "other" platform, the 32-bit PC. You all heard by now what's new in yesterday's press releases and news coverings. But here is a wrap up of the first day of the conference and a commentary on what Apple really announced yesterday, underneath its surrounding distortion field.